


Bonded by Fate

by Blanska



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Gen, Haven, conclave
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-09-02
Updated: 2015-09-02
Packaged: 2018-04-18 17:29:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4714376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blanska/pseuds/Blanska
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Me and my best friend, Móni have created an AU for Inquisition. What if all of our OCs would play a role in the story and how would they influence it? That is what we’re tying to find out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Paths to Haven

## JORIAH

The journey into the mountains was a treacherous one, and exhausting even for the robustious mage. Snowflakes got caught in his beard, his cheeks were flushed from the cold and the marching, but he had to push on. He urged his two companions to keep up, they were already two days late to the peace talks and they couldn’t delay any more. Braving the paths of the Frostback Mountains on foot seemed like an unwise decision to Joriah, but sadly their misfortune didn’t leave him with any other choice.

After he had heard about the Conclave, and that the Divine is actually trying to achieve peace between the mages and templars, Joriah knew right away that he had to travel to the Temple of Sacred Ashes. Whatever would happen at the peace talks, would certainly shape his and all other mages’ future, and if there was truly any chance for peace, he had to do whatever he could to achieve it. He used to be an enchanter at the Ostwick circle, from a noble family too, so his name did carry some weight which could prove to be useful. He informed some of his former colleagues of his intention to travel to the Conclave and three of them decided to join him on the journey. But the Maker had a different plan in store for them. After they had reached Ferelden, Joriah and his companions encountered a group of tevinter soldiers with two mages of their own. They had no choice but to fight them, and with the experienced lead of Joriah, the travelling mages defeated their foes. But only three of them continued the journey. Losing one of his companions was not an easy thing to bear, but Joriah needed to leave the dead behind and make sure that the living reached their destination in one piece.

After the battle, the three mages were unable to find their horses, so they had to carry on without them. Now Joriah was pushing the others to their limits, to reach the temple as soon as possible, but they were exahusted and renewing their hope and motivation seemed like an impossible task. The bearded mage had to use stern commands to keep his companions going, he knew it wasn’t the most effective way to motivate them, but once again he was out of options. They were too close to make a stop, another twenty minutes and they would surely reach the-

And that was when he saw it. A great cloud of green magic expanding over the mountaintop, followed by a montsrous roar of a gigantic explosion. All their hopes for peace, scattered into the wind…

* * *

## SAMAHL

The three dalish elves had arrived to Haven a few days before the Conclave. They travelled to the Forstbacks all the way from the Free Marches, and were quite weary from the long journey. Samahl was tired just like his two friends, although it was impossible to tell because of the overwhelming excitement he radiated. He liked living with clan Lavellan, but he enjoyed travelling and experiencing new things far better. When the Keeper decided to send him to the Conclave, Samahl was overjoyed, and sometimes he still seemed to forget about the reason they came to the Temple of Sacred Ashes. The Keeper had chosen Samahl because he was her First, and he would become Keeper after her. She also sent two hunters with him, two borthers actually, to keep each other safe. Their task was to listen and return with news about the outcome of the peace talks.

Samahl knew that this mission was supposed to be a way to prove that he was ready to take on some responsbilities of a Keeper, still he couldn’t help but see this journey as an exciting adventure, a holiday of some sort. The younger brother, Ren wasn’t worried either, though he always had a calm vibe about him. Taredan, the older brother on the other hand, focused on the mission and already brought back some useful news about the Conclave. Not like Samahl was resting all day long, he did ask the villagers and pilgrims a lot of questions, but mostly they had nothing to do with the peace talks. The mage found these people’s everyday lives and opinions far more interesting than politics and he couldn’t help but try to get to know them better. Earlier, he had met a widowed mother of two, hoping to find safety in Haven, and he had convinced his companions to help her reach the village. There he had met a young boy who gathered herbs and sold them to help his father get by. Samahl didn’t have any coins but he had knowledge to share, so he explained to the lad what kind of herbs he should look out for, and what sort of effects they had.

The two brothers tried to remind him often of their purpose here, but Samahl secretely wished that the peace talks would never end. That was very unlikely, but he hoped that the templars and mages would argue about politics at least for a week. Mabye they would have. But after realising that the cloud of the explosion that shook the montains, arose from the temple where the Conclave was held, and it became clear to the young mage that their mission had come to a grim end.

* * *

## YAEL

She arrived on horseback, already a little bit late to the peace talks, but she couldn’t wait to enter the temple. She had heard much about the place that used to hold Andraste’s sacred ahses and now this blessed ground was the home of the Conclave, perhaps the last chance to achieve real peace between mages and templars.  
She was sent here by her eldest brother, Lord Austyn to represent House Mountell at the peace talks. They weren’t the most powerful and well known family at least outside of Ansburg, but they had wealth and some influence in the Chantry. Her two other borthers were both knights of the Templar Order, and she had many relatives among the chantry sisters and mothers. Yael too had thought about joining the ranks of templars when she was younger, but after her father’s death she had chosen to stay with Austyn and do everything she can for the family.

She hadn’t seen her two templar brothers for years now. Bryce, the younger one, sent letters often, so Yael knew that he would be here at the Conclave. One of her tasks was to bring him home if things went wrong and if he agreed to return to Ansburg. But Gavin… they hadn’t heard anything about him for way too long. The Order should have informed the family if he had died, but no one seemed to know anything of what became of him. Yael had hoped that Bryce would have news about their brother, but he was just as clueless as everyone else. She was glad to see him again, they were always close even when they were little. Bryce used to train with her in the garden for hours, their skills were matched so there was no way to know who was going to win the next duel.

Then one of Bryce’s superiors approached them. He needed to send word to an injured officer back at Haven immediately, so Yael offered to carry the message, since her horse was right outside the temple. She pushed through the crowd, got in the saddle, and rode as quickly as the snow would allow her. She was riding for about a minute when the horse threw her off its back and ran away bewildered by fear. Yael could barely hear anything from the ringing in her ears, but she could see clearly as magical flames devoured the temple. She pushed herself to her feet and unsheathed her sword as the first of the demons poured out of the green sky.

* * *

## MINARESCA

A huge crowd was gathering at the Temple of Sacred Ashes. There were many Chantry clerics, even more templars of all ranks and of course there were almost as many mages. Minaresca was one of them.

After the mage rebellion, she didn’t wish to take sides, she just wanted to stay safe and avoid trouble. She wasn’t the only one, so she managed to find some mages with similar opinions on the war. They were travelling together for months now, and trying to keep each other as safe as possible. When they had heard that the Divine was trying to make peace between the mages and templars, they were already desperate enough to see the peace talks as their best option. They would be surrounded by templars and the Conclave would probably be the worst place to be if the Divine decided against the mages. But the small group of refugees had nowhere else to go, and the Temple of Sacred Ashes seemed like the only place where the war wasn’t raging, at least for the time being.

Minaresca and her five companions had reached the temple safe and sound, and they did their best not to get into any trouble, or not to be noticed at all. They could often hear hostile remarks from both sides, and sometimes the mean comments turned into shouting, but there was always someone to calm these people down. They were at the peace talks after all. Sometimes it felt like Minaresca and her friends were the only ones behaving themselves. Well, they weren’t exactly friends. They barely knew each other before the rebellion, and her travelling companions were all older and more talented than Minaresca. She often felt like she was nothing but a burden to them.

When people started moving into the temple, Minaresca and the others followed the slowly rolling crowd, and tried not to lose each other. They were moving at a very slow pace, and it was after a few minutes that Minaresca realised that she had left her notebook and all her drawings outside. She told her friends that she must go look for her belongings, and they agreed on where to meet her after she had found them. It was hard to push past the people who were all trying to go in the opposite direction, but finally she managed to get back to the place where she has been sitting with her mage friends. The notebook and the drawings were there on the ground, and she was relieved to see that they were undamaged too.

She joined the crowd again, but she tried to hurry and get past people, telling them that she had to find her friends. She wasn’t moving as fast as she wanted, and a very tall warrior making her way out of the temple almost pushed the young mage over. Once Minaresca was inside, she realised that she had no idea which way to go to their meeting place. She tried asking people, mostly mages for directions, but they usually weren’t familiar with the temple either. When she hadn’t seen a single person for long minutes while wandering through the old hallways, she was certain that she was going the wrong way. She turned around to make her way back to the main hall, but then she heard a strange noise. She wasn’t sure what it was, so she started following the sound. She heard shouting, so she began to run, and when she reached the door, she pushed it open without hesitation, and though she didn’t know it yet, this moment changed her entire life.


	2. Facing the Breach

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Where once stood the Temple of Sacred Ashes now there’s a gaping hole in the sky and all our OCs are in the middle of this catastrophe.

## JORIAH

“Can you give them a little food and a place to rest?” Joriah demanded impatiently rather than asked of a chantry sister at the gates of Haven. The young sister nodded gracefully and then led the two exhausted mages towards the Chantry.

The small village was swarming with soldiers of this so called Inquisition that Joriah had never heard about until that moment. As soon as his companions walked away with the sister, the bearded mage called out for one of the soldiers and asked him where they were headed.

“We’re off to the temple.” he answered confirming what Joriah had already suspected.

“Good.” the mage nodded shortly and approached the other man. “I’m coming with you.”

“Um…” the soldier stared at him with a confused, almost shocked look on his face. “I’m not sure you should be doing that, sir. You should talk to the man in charge, Ser Cullen.”

Joriah gave an irritated sigh, then asked the man hurriedly:“Where can I find this Ser Cullen?”

He could barely finish the sentence and a rider appeared not far from them, shouting orders, trying to keep the men in line. The soldier motioned towards him, and hurried after his comrades.

“Ser Cullen?” the bearded mage called as he walked in the commander’s direction.

“Is there a problem?” the blond man asked with a stern look on his face, clearly he didn’t have much patience left.

“I want to come and help your troops.” Joriah stated.

“I don’t even know who you are or if you can help us at all. I don’t have time for this.”

The man sounded frustrated - for obvious reasons - but to the mage it seemed like the commander wanted the exact same thing as he did: to get things done.

“I was an enchanter at Ostwick.” Joriah raised his deep voice to capture the man’s attention again. “I can handle myself. Just let me come with you.”

“I say he should come with us.” they heard a delicate female voice this time. They hadn’t even noticed the red haired woman approaching, but now she was standing next to them, advising Ser Cullen in a quite soothing tone. “We need all the help we can get.”

“Alright.” the rider sighed. “But we have to get going immediately.”

“Don’t worry.” the woman told him, then she looked at the mage with a pale, knowing gaze. “I’ll keep an eye on him.”

Ser Cullen turned his horse around, commanded the troops to move out, and the red haired woman returned to her men as well. Joriah wasn’t sure what was happening at the temple, what caused the explosion, or if he would be any help at all. But he needed to try and do something about this mess. Maybe the mages’ chance for peace was gone forever, but he couldn’t sit idly by when the world was burning around him. He needed to do his part, no matter how small that part might be.

* * *

## YAEL

It seemed like the two shades figured out that they should try to flank the warrior if they wanted to defeat her. Yael could block most of their attacks with her shield, and she managed to land some strikes on her foes as well. She had found a good rhythm of blocking and attacking while always keeping herself out of reach for one of the demons. This technique had worked well so far, but it involved a great deal of moving around and Yael knew that she needed to kill one of the shades before they would succeed to tire her out. Now the blighted things were trying to dance around her, to get behind her back, but fortunately she didn’t have to wait much longer for the opportunity to strike. With a single thrust she ran her sword through one of the demons, and a second later she was ready to do the same to the other one as well. She raised her shield and waited for the shade to make the first move. When it charged at her, she quickly stepped out of its way, and cut at its stomach - if this beast had anything of the sort - and then she waited behind her shield again. The second time, her sword slid along the demon’s side while the warrior danced away from its blow, leaving an ugly wound on the monster. The third time the shade charged was its last time. Yael took it down with a combination of precise moves, and only after the dead demon fell to the ground was when she noticed how exhausted she really was. 

Her eyes searched the ruins and spotted a couple of demons farther away, then she looked behind her, and saw soldiers approaching. Yael leaned on her shield and carefully dropped to her knees. When the first couple of soldiers reached her, she was still panting, but she forced herself back on her feet.

“Are you injured?” a dark haired woman asked her, and helped the fatigued warrior to steady herself.

“I’m good.” Yael replied instantly. “They’re falling from the sky, mostly these black ones and some kinds of spirits. The spirits attack from a distance, but they’re almost defenseless in close combat. I haven’t seen more than five or six of them in the same place. Haven’t met any survivors either.”

“Thank you.” the woman said earnestly. “Our soldiers can take you back to Haven to recover.”

 “There’s no need, I can fight.” Yael protested. “I only needed a few moments.”

There was a rider amongst the footsoldiers, a blond man giving orders, forming smaller groups from his men so they can spread out and search the ruins.

“Let me help the search.” Yael said to the other warrior. 

“Are you certain you have enough strength to fight?” the woman asked.

Yael nodded, and the warrior didn’t seem to doubt her word, so she assigned her to one of the search parties. 

Looking for survivors proved to be a harder task than Yael had originally imagined. There were two archers and two warriors in her party and they didn’t meet large enemy forces along the way, they could handle a couple of demons with ease. But as they entered the ruins, a gruesome view greeted them that Yael would never forget for her her entire life. The horrible picture burned itself into the warrior’s mind, just like the shadows of human lives were burnt into the landscape. There were charred corpses everywhere, and several of them weren’t just lying on the ground, but standing like statues, immortalizing the last moments of the dead. Yael stared at them. She wanted to look away, and banish the thought that one of these morbid statues could have been her brother. She needed to focus, to be present and do her best to help the living. But when you’re standing in the midst of a thousand corpses, hope easily slips away. Then she heard a distant voice, and for just a moment, a single ray of hope had returned: 

“Ser, we found someone!”

* * *

## MINARESCA

The elven mage took her hand quickly and directed the mark at the Rift in front of them. She could feel a strange magical energy running through her fingers and her arm, as her wounded hand glowed brightly. Then the Rift in the air disappeared. 

Minaresca stared at the mark on her hand. When she first came to her senses, she was in some kind of a dungeon, and her first instinct was to try sweeping off whatever was on her left hand. After she had realised that the glowing green thing wasn’t on her hand but inside of it, she panicked and started rubbing it furiously. There were a lot of strange things about, that scared the young mage, including demons, a giant hole in the sky, angry villagers, and even Cassandra who was trying to get her back to the temple safely. But the most terrifying of all was her injury that was slowly expanding and which she knew almost nothing about.

After Solas had successfully closed a Rift using her mark, and explained what little he had learnt about it, Minaresca was almost relieved. At least there was someone who gave her useful information about the thing that was trying to kill her. The dwarf explained that Solas was the one watching over her, and keeping the mark from killing Minaresca in her sleep. This made her feel just a little bit more safe in the company of the elf. She was still terrified of course. Her combat skills were nowhere compared to the other mage, and although there were more people now protecting her, waging war against demons was still a horrifying experience.

When they had finally reached the forward camp, Minaresca thought that she could have a few minutes of peace and safety, but it became clear pretty soon that she was quite wrong about that.

“As Grand Chancellor of the Chantry I hereby order you to take this criminal to Val Royeaux to face execution.” 

The Chancellor had already judged her guilty and it seemed like he completely ignored the huge hole in the sky. This started a heated argument between him, Cassandra and Leliana, but Chancellor Roderick’s hostile words also changed something in Minaresca. She was getting angry. All this running for their lives, killing demons, trying to survive an apocalypse, and the mark on her hand too, it was becoming too much to bear. She knew she had a chance to close the Breach, and they were standing here, arguing about Chantry hierarchy and the Divine’s death. She wanted to prove that she wasn’t the enemy. The mark on her hand was threatening her life. She didn’t want to die, but this personal problem of hers was nothing compared to the Breach which was a danger to everyone.

When Cassandra asked her which way to the temple Minaresca would prefer, she had already made her decision. As they left to brave the mountain path, the young mage tried to clear her thoughts and prepare for the task ahead. They were going back to where everything began. And though she was still afraid and expecting the situation at the temple to be even more terrible, she wanted go through with this. She needed to do what little she could despite of all her fears. She needed to face this Breach in the sky.

* * *

## SAMAHL

The three elves were racing through the forest paths and mountain meadows at the quickest pace they were able to. The two hunters were more used to finding their way through unfamiliar environments, they were also a lot stronger than Samahl, but he was doing his best to keep up. Usually Ren was the one scouting ahead, but Taredan often noticed smoother paths as well. The brothers were working together efficiently in almost total silence, and so far they didn’t run into any kind of obsticles. 

At first Samahl had a gripping feeling in his chest, and after each step he couldn’t help but think that he was going in the wrong direction. As the distance grew larger between them and the temple, this feeling began to fade, but never disappeared completely. Now the explosion seemed like part of a dream, something unreal that must have happened in another world. Yet it didn’t. They were carrying heavy news. Samahl knew that he was doing exactly what the Keeper had asked of him, but still it was so hard to walk away from all these people’s misery. 

He tried not to think about it too much and focus on keeping up with the others the best he could. They stopped sometimes, only for a few seconds to decide which way to go, but this time something was different. Samahl listened carefully, and just when the others chose a suitable path, he stated:

“I hear fighting.” 

“Yes. I can hear it as well.” Ren agreed casually.

As soon as he said the words, Samahl disappeared between the trees, and ran as swiftly as he could in the sounds’ direction.

“Lethallin, don’t!” he could hear Taredan’s voice in the distance, but he didn’t turn back and didn’t slow down.

Suddenly he reached a wide road, and there he saw some refugees - couldn’t be more than ten - desperately fighting for their lives against a bunch of demons. There was a big, green thing in the air, right next to the road, it must had been where the demons came from. As soon as he spotted the refugees, Samahl summoned barriers around them, and froze one of the shades. He started shooting ice at the demons, just to get their attention, and hoped that his companions would appear in time, preferably before his foes had reached him. He didn’t have to wait for long for the two brothers to join the fight, their swift arrows suprised the shades and together they defeated them quickly.

As soon as the demons fell, Samahl rushed to one of the injured refugees. Some of the humans seemed very grateful for saving their lives, but others stayed silent and eyed the dalish elves with suspicion. The mage was too busy to notice of course, he exemined the human’s injury, then searched his bag for herbs and bandages. He cleared the wound with water, but when he put his hand upon the human’s leg and tried to use healing magic, the man pulled away and asked in a terrified voice:

“What are you doing?”

“I need to speed up the healing.” the elf replied, then he continued in a reassuring, soothing tone. “It will help your body to heal the wound faster. Then I’ll bandage you, and you’ll be alright in a few days. Just hold still.” 

The hunters waited for the mage to tend to the refugee’s wounds, but when he began to check the other human’s injuries as well, Taredan had enough.

“Samahl, we need to go.” he told him.

“No. We need to help them.” the mage answered without looking up from his work.

“We did what we came here to do.”

“Please.” Samahl stood up to face the other elf. “I can’t walk away from these people. I won’t. They won’t make it on their own, they can’t defend themselves. We can make sure they reach safety. We’ll have plenty of time to go home after.”

Taredan stood there silently for a while, but after some of the refugees almost begged him to listen to his friend, he agreed to Samahl’s request. 

The mage gave him a heartfelt smile and then went back to tending wounds. After a couple of minutes the group put a comfortable distance between themselves and the green, floating object, and hoped that they could avoid smiliar threats with the help of the two experienced scouts. Samahl stayed with the refugees, he was more useful there. Taredan and Ren could guarantee that they reached the Hinterlands safely, and Samahl could make sure that they reached it without falling to despair.

**Author's Note:**

> Please, let me know if you want us to continue the story. Because if you do, we will start working on the next chapter!


End file.
